


And The Father Hen Will Call His Chickens Home

by Edoraslass



Category: Inception (2010), Terminator (Movies), Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, more gen than shippy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-17
Updated: 2013-03-17
Packaged: 2017-12-05 13:29:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/723816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Edoraslass/pseuds/Edoraslass
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time Eames meets Arthur, Eames is twenty years old, Arthur is forty-three, and he hasn’t been Arthur in almost a decade.</p><p>The first time Arthur meets Eames, Arthur is twenty-five years old, and Eames is twenty-eight.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And The Father Hen Will Call His Chickens Home

**Author's Note:**

> Age disparity [43/20], questionable sexual ethics but all consensual, timey-wimey-wibbley-wobbliness, scars, nihilism, frat boys, applied phlebotinum, possible screw-up of GMT conversion 
> 
> Elements of Terminator, T2, Sarah Connor Chronicles, so **possible spoilers** for all those, but none for Salvation, cause seriously. No.
> 
> Title from Mr. Johnny Cash, "When The Man Comes Around"

~*~

The first time Eames meets Arthur, Eames is twenty years old, Arthur is forty-three, and he hasn’t been Arthur in almost a decade.

The first time Arthur meets Eames, Arthur is twenty-five years old, and Eames is twenty-eight.

~*~

There are things people assume are true:

Arthur was in the military.

No-one knows Arthur’s real name.

Eames was in the military.

Robert Fischer’s projections sent Saito into limbo.

~*~

Eames loves silk. He loves satin, he loves crisp Egyptian cotton, lush cashmere and the deep pile of velvet, loves the way the fabrics caress his skin. He loves wearing a riot of colours, the contrast of the conflicting shades. He hates wearing blacks, greys, browns, earthy tones that will let him blend into the shadows.

Once he’d planned to be an artist, a painter, and his eyes are starved for all the hues of the rainbow, for brightness and patterns.

~*~

Arthur’s never been in the military. He will be, one day. But not yet.

There are people who know Arthur’s real name, but those people are not who anyone in dreamshare might think. A priest in Mexico, a gun-runner in San Salvador. An ancient _abuelita_ in Nicaragua. An ex-FBI agent. A being who looks like a man but is not. 

Eames is still in the military. He’s carrying out the last orders issued to him by his commanding officer.

Robert Fischer’s mind was militarized, to be sure. But his projections didn’t shoot Saito. Arthur’s did.

~*~

Arthur’s mother’s rule was _Stay in the most expensive place you can afford. Cops always look in the rathole motels first; they never expect to find a wanted criminal at the Ritz._

Arthur took that rule one step further. The feds never expect a man with a rap sheet like Arthur’s to be wearing bespoke from Saville Row. They don’t expect someone on the FBI’s list to be flying first class or throwing away money on breathtakingly expensive restaurants. 

Arthur’s also learned that money buys privacy. The more expensive the hotel, the more discreet the employees; the more esteemed the tailor, the less likely he is to talk about his clients. The wealthy always have something to hide, and money lets them do so with ease. 

Arthur has a great deal money, and even more to hide.

~*~

Eames is not a dreamer. He can count on one hand the number of times he’s held the dream. He says that his projections react badly to the intrusion, that he can’t forge and dream at the same time, that he simply can’t keep the dream stable, and usually, this is enough. There are always other people willing to carry that responsibility.

The truth, of course, is that Eames doesn’t know how to dream of anything before Judgment Day. He can’t reproduce the fine details of how cities looked, how people walked and talked and ate, because he doesn’t remember. If he dreams, it’s of bleached skulls, buildings crumbling to the ground in flames, monochrome landscapes, guns and fear. Or it’s all Technicolor grass and skies too blue, too Impressionistic to exist, simplistic buildings out of a child’s storybook or high arching structures that obey no laws of physics.

~*~

Arthur was one of the first in dreamshare because Arthur knew it was an inevitability. He’d been tracking the technology for years, and he could see the possibilities. Could see how the PASIV and all that it implied might be his greatest advantage.

Arthur became the best point man in the industry because no-one is as persistent as Arthur in digging up information, in researching, in connecting point A to point B and coming up with a weakness to be exploited. No-one else is as persistent as Arthur because to everyone else, it’s just a job. A lucrative, dangerous, exciting job, but a job nonetheless. 

To Arthur, it’s a mission.

~*~

The first time Eames meets Arthur, he’s terrified. He knows he shouldn’t be; he’s only been summoned because of his bravery in defending an isolated bunker from the machines. It’s nothing unusual, in the course of things: you make a good showing in the field, the brass will notice.

But this isn’t his sarge. It’s not his lieutenant. This is the man who brought them all together, who holds them together and gives them hope through nothing but sheer force of will. He’s a legend, he’s _the_ legend, and if the human race survives, it’ll be because of him.

He commends Eames in the most official way possible, but he never breaks eye contact. On the surface, his gaze is distant and cool, but beneath, Eames can see hunger lurking, a hint of desperation. Longing. 

Eames knows he’s attractive. His looks have gotten him information, have been bartered for a bigger portion of food or a pair of mittens, a warmer, safer place to sleep. He doesn’t know how many times he’s sucked a cock for nothing more than an extra piece of bread; don’t even ask what he’s done for a mug of rotgut whisky. His body’s an asset, he has no qualms about using it, and he’s had that hungry look aimed at him many a time, by men and women alike.

He’d be disappointed that the leader of the resistance is as human as the next man (tasteless as the phrase is), if it weren’t for the fact that he’s as fanatically devoted to their leader as anyone.

~*~

Arthur’s dreams are, like everything else about him, meticulous. Paintings hung just so, clothes strewn around rooms with mathematical precision, complementing colours from sky to ground to the brick of the buildings. Details perfect down to the last leaf on the last tulip. Privately he refers to this kind of architecture as “set design”.

His projections are suspicious, one and all, because his subconscious never stops suspecting ulterior motives. Two projections are ever-present, no matter how hard he tries to keep them away. A young woman with long dark hair and big brown eyes with a smile like an angel. An older woman with dark hair, all whipcord and muscle, an merciless gaze that turns red before she attacks. The two of them can destroy an intruder in a heartbeat.

Sometimes there’s a young blonde woman with bandages on her wrists; it’s best to shoot out when she appears. She’s passive, not vicious, but her appearance means Arthur’s in a dark mood, and when that’s the case, Arthur’s mind is dangerous place to be.

~*~

The first time Arthur meets Eames, he hears his mother’s voice in his head: _You can’t afford emotional ties. They’ll get you killed. They’ll get people you care about killed. Look what happened to Charlie. Look what happened to Riley, to Derek. You have to be smarter than that._

Arthur isn’t his mother. He can’t detach himself the way she wanted him to. She tried to hide him away with nothing but herself and Cameron for company, and he lashed out at every turn, suffocated by the isolation. He doesn’t trust easily or completely – she taught him that well – but he’s not as strong as she was. He can be aloof, but he can’t cut himself off from humanity. 

He trusts Cobb as far as he trusts anyone, because Cobb’s relentless focus reminds him of his mother, although he’ll never admit this to anyone, much less himself.

His mother and Cameron are in his pocket, always, inside a small red die. His mother would hate that, her ashes being entombed with what’s left of the chip, but he couldn’t let her be buried in a potter’s field, couldn’t trust that a mortician wouldn’t be bribed. He built a pyre and set her alight; he refused to let Cameron help and paid for it with strained muscles and palmsful of blisters. His mother would have said that was an unnecessary, sentimental risk. 

His mother never understood. She never understood that he has to be _part_ of humanity in order to save it.

~*~

Arthur insists on going under with all new team members before he’ll agree to work with them. It’s non-negotiable. If you want to work with Arthur and the Cobbs, you’re the dreamer at least once.

Eames puts up a token resistance because it’s expected, but it’s not as if he’s going to walk away from this job. It’s taken him two years to build up a reputation; two years to hunt down Arthur and charm his way into being offered this chance.

Arthur doesn’t look surprised or even all that interested in the dreamscape Eames has built; he’s expressionless, and his stance makes it clear that this is a test. Because machines don’t dream. Because if Eames is hunting Arthur, this will out him as an assassin.

They’re wandering down a street in what appears to be ancient Rome by way of Van Gogh when a woman walks directly towards them. A young woman with long dark hair and big brown eyes, a peculiar tilt to her head, a woman who moves too precisely. She shows up in Eames’ subconscious sometimes, and he always mows her down before she can do anything. Because in Eames’ dreamscape, she can be killed. 

And right here, right now, he can’t let Arthur catch sight of her, so hastily Eames conjures up an AK-47 and disintegrates her head.

Before he can blink, Eames finds himself on the ground, a shining silver blade a hair’s breadth from sinking into his eye. A shining silver blade that is actually an extension of Arthur’s arm. _Oh fuck,_ Eames thinks wildly, afraid to even breathe. _Oh fuck, that was_ his _projection, not mine._

Arthur tilts his head to the side, blinks once slowly, and Eames is unnervingly reminded of that goddamn metal bitch. _Did she get that from him, or did he get it from her?_ “Are you Grey?” he asks, voice eerily flat. For an instant, his eyes glow red and Eames can’t hold back a whimper of fear. _“Are you Grey?”_

“I’m…I’m Eames, 121st SOC, sir!” Eames blurts, raising his hands in supplication. “You sent me.”

Arthur studies him wordlessly a moment, casts his glance around the dreamscape, where a cluster of Eames’ projections stand watching them. Even though Eames is pinned to the ground, even though Arthur looks like a machine, the projections aren’t reacting. One of them’s beaming at Arthur like he’s Elvis and Jesus combined, the traitorous fucker.

“Shit,” Arthur sighs. “I wish I’d stop doing that.”

An older woman stands behind Arthur; dark-haired, lean, with eyes unforgiving as steel, arms crossed over her chest. “And you’re just going to believe him?” she asks, scornful. “That’s enough for you? Jesus, did you listen to anything I taught you?”

Arthur rubs his forehead wearily. “Mom, can you _please_ shut the fuck up just once?” he growls, and changes his arm back to one of flesh.

~*~

Every night Eames stays in the command bunker, he wakes up expecting to be dragged out by the metal “female”. He never assumes it’s anything other than comfort, but he’s given himself to more cruel men for a lot less, and he’d be lying if he said that he didn’t find comfort in it as well. He goes out on patrol, and when he returns, always expects to be turned away.

It never happens. His fellow soldiers stopped giving him shit about fucking the brass so gradually that Eames never notices. He’s shown no favoritism, other than getting to sleep inside on those nights he’s admitted to the bunker. Eames knows damn well that this is a one-sided relationship, that he’s the only one head-over-heels, no matter what soft words are murmured in the grey hours of dawn, but he doesn’t care. He takes what he can get. 

Days become weeks become months, and he’s never turned away.

He still eats with his squad; still goes out patrol and gets his ass shot at, still huddles in the rain and catches pneumonia. Still gets captured by the machines and thrown in a work camp.

~*~

Arthur’s never known anyone like Eames: he’s too cheerful, dresses too flamboyantly for a man in such a highly illegal profession, and is _far_ too tactile for Arthur’s taste – but he’s staggeringly competent and outstrips even Arthur himself with a gun. Sometimes he’s socially awkward, but Arthur won’t hold that against anyone. He himself is not exactly socially deft. It’s not the kind of thing his mother put much stock in, giving a shit about social niceties.

Eames eats revolting combinations of food like peanut butter and fish tacos, bubbles with exuberance over something as simple as sparkling bottled water, hurls himself into everything he does with single-minded zeal.

Mal adores Eames, predictably calling him “full of _joie de vivre_ ”, and delightedly urges him to greater lengths of ridiculousness. Cobb calls Eames “eccentric”, which is Dom-speak for “batshit”. 

Arthur doesn’t want to find Eames charming. He knows that Eames’ enthusiasm is fatalism; that his seeming passion for life is, in actuality, nothing more than the nihilism of a man who’s determined to glut himself on the pleasures of this world before it’s destroyed. 

But he does despite himself.

~*~

“What am I like?” Arthur’s on the other side of the hotel balcony, staring down at the city. “Cameron would never…she would never really tell me anything. She would just say ‘you’re strong’ or ‘you operate with acceptable parameters most of the time’.”

“She _is_ a machine,” Eames says with a chuckle that comes out slightly harder than he’d meant for it to.

“Was,” Arthur corrects, hand going to the pocket where he keeps his totem. 

Eames almost asks what happened to her, because it feels as if Arthur wants to explain, but he doesn’t really give a fuck, so instead he answers Arthur’s question.

“Strong,” he says, and grins when Arthur shoots him an unamused glare. “Well, you are. You’re strong for all of us. For everyone. Your strength keeps us together, gives us hope.” Eames falls silent for a moment, suddenly reluctant, as if he’s giving away secrets, which makes no sense. But this isn’t the man Eames knows, and it is telling secrets, after a fashion.

He doesn’t realize he isn’t talking until Arthur sighs and runs his hands through his hair. “So that’s it then?” he asks tiredly. “That’s all I am, ‘strong’. My mother would be so proud.”

Eames would definitely like to ask about his mother, but doesn’t dare. He glances over at Arthur, and is struck with a peculiar shyness. He stopped being shy years ago, although he never quite got over the hero-worship. He casts about for something to say, something that will ease the tension in Arthur’s shoulders without babbling like a twelve-year-old with a crush.

“You’re …you’re fair,” Eames says finally. “You’re stubborn, and you don’t give up, even when maybe you should. You’d rather risk yourself on a rescue mission than your men. I’ve seen you go without food for days so someone else could eat. And …” he trails off awkwardly, because his memories are too few and too personal to share, even with Arthur. 

“And?” Arthur raises one eyebrow, and it’s the same as always, Eames can’t resist him anything. 

“You’re lonely.” The words are out before Eames even knows he’s thinking them.

Arthur jerks, his breath leaving him in a rush. He stands straight as a rod, jaw clenched tightly, and out of nowhere, Eames is nearly choked by a wave of homesickness. _That’s_ the man he knows, the man he’s gone sleep with and waken up next to so many times. That’s the man he’d die for.

He quickly looks down, unexpected tears pricking his closed eyelids, and he doesn’t even notice when Arthur leaves.

~*~

“Where were you?” Arthur asks when Eames arrives back after lunch one day.

“Surfing,” Eames answers readily; he’s only surprised that it took Arthur this long to ask. “My father was a corporate lawyer, school was out for the holidays and he’d taken us all to San Diego. I was out on the water …”

_...feet dangling in the ocean, not waiting for a wave, just drifting. He’d heard an odd sound, glanced towards the beach. The flash off the water blinded him; the shockwave knocked him off his board down down down into darkness can’t tell which way is up can’t see can’t breathe oh God help thrashing sinking choking heartbeat roaring in his ears…_

“…couple of frat boys sailing daddy’s boat fished me out. I couldn’t see for three days…”

_They kept crying. They’d be silent for hours on end, then one would burst into tears. Or one would fall into hysterics, ranting about the end of the world. I was terrified at what I’d see once my vision came back, terrified that I’d never be able to see again._

“…we stayed out on the water for a couple of weeks – daddy kept the boat well-stocked – and when we came back in, there was nothing. No docks, no piers, no buildings. No people. Nothing but the machines.”

The machine had taken the frat boys two days later. Eames ran while it torn them apart.

Arthur’s looking at him with undisguised horror, face ashen and guilt radiating from his entire body. His fingers grip the chair arms so tightly his knuckles have gone white. When he speaks, his voice is spun-glass fragile. “I meant…you weren’t answering your phone. Where were you?”

Eames doesn’t understand for a moment, disoriented by memory. In his world, _Where were you?_ means only one thing. 

He pulls himself back to this present, trying to shrug it off. “Traffic was a bitch.”

~*~

Eames can’t work with Arthur all the time, and he doesn’t like it. He wasn’t sent back to be a tourist, he was sent back to guard Arthur. It took him long enough to find Arthur in the first place, and he is adamantly, violently against letting Arthur go off with no-one but Cobb for protection.

“Goddammit, Eames, I’ve kept myself alive for three years!” Arthur’s yelling. “Do you actually think that no machines have come after me in all that time? Do you really think I’d turn down backup if I wasn’t sure I could handle anything that might happen?”

“Yes, I bloody well do!” Eames barks. “Haven’t you said a hundred times how your mother didn’t want you to have to depend on anyone, how you’ve had to learn to accept help?“

Arthur blinks at him, because, of course, Arthur has never said any such thing. “I’m not him,” Arthur says, voice almost steady. “ _I’m not him._ You can’t…you have to stop treating me like I’m him.”

“But you _are_ ,” is all Eames can say, bewildered. “You _will be_ him.”

“But I’m not _now_.” Arthur’s practically snarling. “I don’t – you remember a different me, Eames. I’m _not him_ , fuck, I don’t even know if you and I….” he trails off, but the knife’s already sunk. 

Eames stares at him, jaw clenched against all the words that want to come pouring out. He didn’t expect Arthur to fall neatly into the hole in his heart, really he didn’t, but neither did he expect to his assistance, his expertise and everything he’s offering to be summarily rejected, like he’s a stranger.

Except that he is, isn’t he? A stranger in this time, a stranger to the one person he knows and loves and would give his life to protect, and fast becoming a stranger to himself. 

“Don’t make me order you to not follow me.” Arthur’s voice is low and Eames can hear the self-loathing, but he still recoils as if Arthur had actually punched him.

“I’m not your fucking pet machine,” Eames spits, and now it’s Arthur who flinches as if struck. “I don’t have to do a goddamn thing you order me to.”

“But you would, if I did.” Arthur is confident, unshakable, and again Eames is overwhelmed with homesickness. 

He stands up so swiftly that he nearly knocks over the flimsy hotel room table. “ _You_ already gave me an order,” he growls. ““ _You_ ordered me _not_ to leave you.”

“Eames.” Arthur abruptly turns cajoling. “You can’t come with us. I can’t explain this to Cobb. I can’t explain it to Mal. Men trying to kill me – and them – they understand. Even men who don’t go down after taking an entire clip to the chest. They even understand projections of cyborgs and people made of liquid metal, because as far as they know, that’s just my fucked-up subconscious.” Eames swallows a bark of laughter; he refuses to make this easy.

“But I can’t explain a forger suddenly dogging my every step,” Arthur continues; he’s moved next to Eames, has lightly placed his hand on Eames’ forearm, where the work camp tattoo used to be. “You being there would only put me in more danger.” His thumb brushes over the inside of Eames’ wrist; it makes Eames a little light-headed. “I’ll use only you if we need a forger. We’ll set up a check-in routine. But you can’t come with me every time.”

For a brief, blinding moment, Eames hates him. Hates that he doesn’t have to be given an order, that Arthur can just be himself, and Eames will do anything for him.

He takes a deep, shuddering breath, and lays his hand against Arthur’s cheek. “I miss you,” he breathes, and if Arthur assumes what Eames says means “I miss you already”, then Eames isn’t going to enlighten him.

~*~

Arthur knows it’s not a particularly smart idea, sleeping with Eames, but he’s hard to resist. Not just physically – although that sly little-half smile and the way he stands, hip cocked and arms loosely crossed over his broad chest like he’s waiting to spring into action are difficult to ignore.

If he were any other man, Arthur wouldn’t even bother trying to talk himself out of it. Arthur is not one to deny himself pleasure on principle; Arthur knows that today may be all that any of them have, that tomorrow they could wake up on fire or not wake up at all, so he takes what he can get and doesn’t waste time on regrets.

But the way Eames looks at him gives Arthur pause. He hasn’t heard the whole story yet, but he’s gathered that, in the future, they’re together, in some way. He knows that Eames was young, if anyone in that future is truly young, and that he was a lot older. Not only that, but he’s the fucking leader of the resistance, a position of considerable power. 

Eames can’t keep the shine of adoration out of his eyes when he watches Arthur, even if Arthur’s only giving a PowerPoint presentation. His gaze follows Arthur everywhere, worshipful and reverent and yes, hungry for something Arthur doesn’t know if he can give. 

He wonders if he turns into the type of man who’d take advantage of a young, war-brutalized kid. He wonders if he turns into the type of man who’d coerce a star-struck boy into his bed for comfort. He wonders if he drew Eames to him because of their past, the past which is actually Arthur’s present, and if he gave Eames a choice in the matter.

He wonders what Eames’ mouth tastes like.

~*~

Eames tries to understand why Arthur doesn’t respond to his admittedly less-than-subtle advances. He represses the urge to follow Arthur around like a puppy, eager just to be near him, and instead challengesArthur at all turns. He never acted like that in the past, but here, it’s more difficult to act impassive than Eames would have predicted.

He’s enthralled by the sight of Arthur in a suit. Eames has never seen him groomed within an inch of his life, face clean-shaved, every hair in place. He’s never seen those dimples in the daylight, never heard that laugh so unfettered by bitterness and the crushing weight of responsibility. It’s intoxicating, and Eames does whatever he can to make Arthur flash just a hint of that smile. 

He’s not entirely the man Eames knows. Now Arthur’s more flexible in his thinking. Now he’s less sure of himself, harder on everyone else around him, less able to make blatant intimidation of his coworkers look like asking for a personal favour. He’s just as able to formulate a new, brilliant, plan on the fly when the old one goes completely south, just as likely to drive himself into the ground, taking responsibility for everything and everyone, if someone doesn’t force him to ease up.

In a lot of ways, he’s more of an asshole, and Eames finds himself constantly antagonizing and being antagonized by Arthur simply by forgetting Arthur’s not going to react now like he did then. But he’s also more open, warmer, friendlier, and surprisingly, Arthur with a sense of humour makes Eames ache more than all of the other differences combined. There’s enough the same about him to be comfortingly familiar; enough changed to throw Eames off-balance and alienate him.

Still, the job ends too quickly. Eames is in his room packing to fly fuck only knows where, while Arthur begins another job for the Cobbs, and his temper is foul. He likes Mal, but he hates Dom for keeping him from doing a far more important job, although he thinks he hides it well enough. At least from Dom.

He’s surprised when the knock on his door turns out to be Arthur, still buttoned into his immaculate suit. There’s an expression on his face Eames has never seen before, something almost vulnerable. But he’s seen that look in Arthur’s eyes before, when they first met, and Eames’ heart leaps.

“You’re right,” Arthur says, never breaking their gaze. “I am lonely.”

Eames takes Arthur’s hand, and draws him into the room.

~*~

Arthur’s out of practice having someone around who knows who he is, who knows Judgment Day is fast approaching. His mother’s been gone four years, Cameron three, and he’s not used to being around someone who knows so many of his secrets.

Even if Eames isn’t as physically omnipresent as those two women were, he’s still ubiquitous. They communicate at least every three days by phone or email – once Arthur forgot to touch base, and Eames came roaring into Tunisia, armed to the teeth and ready to mow down an entire bar’s worth of drunken ex-pats, and Arthur never forgot again. 

It’s a bit discomfiting, how easily he slips back into old habits; it’s even more discomfiting when Arthur realizes how many of habits he doesn’t have to slip _back_ into. He’s kept them up because the line of work he’s chosen requires much the same security as running from the machines. 

He says as much to Eames one night in Marseilles; Eames laughs until tears run down his face, and can’t explain why that’s so funny. 

Eames is never any more accepting of leaving Arthur after a job than he was the first time, but he’s more resigned. There’s always a fight; there’s usually angry, almost frantic sex, and then they go their separate ways. 

More and more often, however, Arthur finds himself looking for reasons to use a forger. He finds himself looking Eames up between jobs, passing time with him in cities all over the globe, teaching him how to use a computer more efficiently, how to research, how to operate under the radar and off the grid. Eames was only sixteen on Judgment Day, and there’s a lot about this time that he’s forgotten or never had the chance to learn. 

Arthur would never say, _If I sent you into the TDE, it’s because I remembered you being here, with me at the age I am now. If you weren’t older than you are now in my future, it means you’re dead._ But he thinks it. 

And he wonders if he saw Eames die.

~*~

Eames knows every inch of Arthur’s body as well as he does his own, or at least, he used to. It’s the same, and yet it’s learning him all over again. There are things Arthur’s never let him do before (tying him up, for one), and there are things Eames assumes Arthur wants that are clearly new to Arthur’s experience (rimming was a relevation).

And then there are those things that Eames does perfectly, playing Arthur like a well-loved instrument with hands and teeth and tongue. Afterwards Arthur always expresses shock at Eames’ expertise, and Eames just chuckles. Once he’d said, unthinking, “I’ve had a good deal of practice”. Arthur had gone rigid in his arms, and they didn’t share a bed for months.

It doesn’t bother him that Arthur doesn’t know his body the same way. Not when Arthur is so intently focused on learning Eames’ likes and dislikes, on working out how to make Eames moan and quiver and beg. 

There are times when Eames will stay awake for hours and trace idle patterns on Arthur’s skin while he sleeps. There some scars, but most of the scars Eames remembers don’t yet exist. The knife wound here, the badly-healed fingers and snarled burned flesh all down his side, the bits of shrapnel still embedded above his left hip. The rough groove down his forehead, across his cheek. 

Sometimes Eames can’t help missing those scars. He wonders Arthur will feel the same way, when he meets twenty-year-old Eames.

~*~

They work together two or three times a year, which is not enough for Eames’ liking, but he doesn’t really have a say. Or rather, he has a say, he has a great deal of says, but Arthur doesn’t often take his opinion into consideration.

A machine finds them in Berlin, in the middle of a goddamn film festival. Fortunately most attendees are drunk and think it’s some sort of promotion.

One hunts down Arthur when he’s alone in St. Petersburg. He manages to ram it into the almost-frozen Neva with a bread truck, and runs like hell.

Eames stumbles across one in Ecuador, and destroys it with the help of some very determined villagers. Arthur never visits South America. He says he’s too likely to be recognized. Eames reminds himself to find a way to let the machines know Arthur’s hiding out in Argentina.

One walks right up to them, cool as can be, in Kampala, and Eames yanks his gun out, ready to shoot, when Arthur shouts, “No, wait! _Wait_!” , proceeds to _introduce_ the fucking thing as John Henry, and spends the rest of the night explaining that bullshit to a furious Eames. 

There’s not as many as Eames had thought there would be, but even so, it’s still too many. Arthur shouldn’t be on his own, distracted by dreamsharing.

~*~

Eames works in the dreamscape as often as it pleases him. When he’s not working, he recklessly spends his earnings on food, drink, clothes, travel, men and women. He’s got no real sense of money – never had the need to learn – and it gets him into trouble more than once.

Sometimes he follows Arthur. Sometimes Arthur knows it, sometimes he doesn’t. Or at least sometimes he doesn’t let Eames know that he’s aware.

He paints. Sometimes he shuts himself up in an apartment and doesn’t leave for days on end, painting until he drops with exhaustion. His canvases are much like his dreams: either stomach-churning nightmares, or bright and glorious as a four-year-old’s Christmas wishes. He abandons the paintings, leaves them in rented flats or on the curb next to the bins for anyone to take. 

Once in Monaco, he spots a machine working as a croupier, of all things, and can’t help trying his hand at that table. Being this close to one of them brings all his old battle instincts back to life, stripping every nerve raw, making him hyperaware of his own breath, the blood beating in his veins. He can’t believe the other people have no idea. It’s so obvious that it’s not human, from the way it deals the cards with unnatural precision, how it doesn’t blink often enough. 

He waits until its shift is over, follows it, runs over it with his rented Humvee until it’s damaged enough that he can pull the chip out of its head and dumps the exoskeleton into the just-poured foundation of a building.

He abandons the Humvee and Monaco; he sends a text to Arthur that reads only _T-888_ , and when Arthur finds him in Belarus, he’s locked in his hotel bathroom, still having flashbacks.

~*~

They’re lying in a huge hotel bed in Vienna, exhausted and spent; they haven’t seen each other in far too long. The way Eames knows exactly how Arthur fucks and likes to be fucked would corroborate his story about their relationship in the future if Arthur had any doubts. He doesn’t entirely trust Eames, but then he doesn’t entirely trust anyone. He doesn’t doubt Eames’ story, though. He’s seen himself, older, harder, colder, in Eames’ mind, just once. Eames had refused to show him again, and he hadn’t wanted to see.

“Is he a better person than me?” The question spills out before Arthur can stop it. 

Eames’ breath hitches, stops. After a moment, he inhales sharply and replies, “You _are_ him.” 

“Not yet,” Arthur points out, even though he can tell that Eames doesn’t want answer. 

Eames is silent; he pulls his arm away from where it lays across Arthur’s shoulders. “You’re very different men.”

Arthur makes a noise of exasperation and rolls onto his back. “That’s not what I asked.” He looks towards Eames; he can dimly see the outline of his profile in the darkness.

There’s a long pause, then Eames sits up, gets off the bed, and leaves the room. After a minute or two, Arthur hears the door to the suite open and shut. 

Eames doesn’t come back that night. He doesn’t come back for six months.

~*~

When Mal dies, Arthur can’t believe Cobb’s story. He’s sure the machines have to be involved somehow. They’re out there, and it’s been too long since one tried to flush him out of hiding. Killing someone close to Arthur is standard operating procedure, and he convinces Cobb to leave the country before the funeral, so he’ll have an excuse to not attend. It would be the perfect place for an ambush, and he hasn’t survived this long by falling for such obvious traps.

Eames goes in his place. He liked Mal, although when he reports back to Arthur, he doesn’t seem especially upset by her death. When Arthur asks him if he’s all right, fearing another PTSD episode, Eames gives him a puzzled look and says, “They’re all dead, Arthur. You know that”, and disturbingly, Arthur misses his mother with a shocking fierceness that stays with him for days.

~*~

Eames keeps a small apartment in Mombasa; nothing extravagant, although four walls, a roof, and running water are not things that Eames will ever take for granted.

He’s at a small café, waiting to discuss a job with a chemist, when he hears a familiar voice. Not familiar from this world, familiar from another time. When he casually glances around, he nearly falls off his barstool in shock. 

He’d know the chemist’s name was Yusuf, but it’s a common enough name that it had only given him a twinge of melancholy. It had never crossed his mind that it could be his Yusuf, the Yusuf who took him in and looked after him when he was starving and sick, desperately trying to outrun the machines on his own.

Eames does his best to not gape at this younger version of the man who saved his life. He doesn’t know how this works; doesn’t know if he should slip out the back door and vanish from Mombasa, doesn’t know what will happen if he stays. 

In the end, he doesn’t leave, of course.

~*~

Arthur’s been digging into Proclus Global and Cobol long before he and Cobb were approached by Cobol; they’re huge corporations with hundreds of subsidiaries, and many of those subsidiaries are involved in robotics and AI research. He isn’t surprised when he finds that Cobol has ties to Kaliba and Yutani; realizes how great the risk is when he finds that Proclus holds a majority share of Cyberdyne’s stocks.

Arthur is nowhere near as particular about jobs as people think he is. He doesn’t dislike personal jobs because they’re beneath him, it’s that those types of jobs are worth nothing more than a paycheck. In the grand scheme of things, they don’t matter. He looks specifically for jobs that have some tie to Cyberdyne, and anything else is pointless.

The Cobol job matters, and the risk … Arthur’s mother would say that the risk doesn’t. And he would agree with her.

~*~

“What was it like?” Arthur asks. He always asks these questions when they’re naked and still wrapped around each other; he doesn’t do it all the time, but Eames has stopped being surprised when he does. “Going through the TDE, I mean.”

His voice is impersonal enough for Eames to know that he’s just asking out of technological curiosity. “Hot,” he replies, brushing a sweat-soaked clump of hair from Arthur’s forehead. “Almost unbearably hot, then suffocating, as if the air was being sucked from my lungs. They told me to keep my eyes closed, but I could still see the light flashing.” He doesn’t say anything about how it reminded him of J-Day, how he panicked and nearly tried to throw himself out. “There was a roaring in my ears, then terrible, terrible cold. And then there I was, naked as I am now.”

Arthur flashes a grin, runs his hand over Eames’ chest. “I don’t know what I went through,” he says thoughtfully. “I don’t think it was a real TDE, but it functioned the same way. One minute in 1999, the next, boom, 2007.”

Eames doesn’t say anything; knowing when to and when not to ask questions is key in getting information out of Arthur.

“So…” the overly-causal tone makes Eames tense; it always means Arthur’s going to ask something Eames may not want to answer. “What did he say to make you come here?”

Eames closes his eyes, and exhales slowly through his nose, trying to keep his voice steady. “You weren’t there.” 

Arthur stiffens. “I…wasn’t there?”

Eames shakes his head. He doesn’t know why he doesn’t make something up, why he doesn’t just refuse to answer.

“Why wasn’t I there?” Arthur’s sat upright, outraged. “Six years, that’s what you said, right? Six years of being…together, and I _wasn’t even there_ when I sent you away?”

Eames sits up as well, clenches his fists underneath the sheets. He’s trying to formulate a reply when comprehension dawns across Arthur’s face. “You mean I was dead.”

Eames never meant to have this conversation. He never wanted to admit that he knows when Arthur dies; has never really it admitted to himself. The future is constantly in flux, right? Goddamn Arthur, goddamn his own inability to lie to the man about his future. He slides out of the bed, too agitated to sit still.

“That fucking metal bitch told me,” he says as he looks for his discarded sweatpants. “The brass wasn’t going to tell anyone, they weren’t about to let us all know their leader had died, they were going to go on as normal. That _machine_ told me. She said –“ Eames’ throat has gone almost too thick to speak “- she said I ‘deserved to know the truth’.” 

Abruptly his legs won’t hold him, and he sinks to the floor. “They weren’t going to tell even me, just let me think you’d gone MIA.”

Arthur’s kneeling next to him, hands fluttering as if he’s not sure he’s allowed to touch Eames or not. “She’s the one who sent me,” Eames chokes out. “She said _you_ ordered _her_ to send me, when you died. You told her _where_ to send me.”

She’d said, “His orders are ‘Don’t leave him’.” She’d looked at him with those flat, dead eyes and said, “You were what he needed. He cared for you,” right before she pushed the button. That fucking _machine_ had given more of a shit than any of the men he’d known and faithfully obeyed for years.

Arthur’s hand finally lands hesitantly on his shoulder, and Eames crumbles.

~*~

Eames doesn’t like Dominick Cobb, never has and never will, because it’s Cobb that keeps him from carrying out his duty. He doesn’t give a sailing fuck if Cobol kills Cobb or if Cobb’s locked up in prison and the key thrown away. But he agrees to the inception job because Arthur has already emailed him the details on the financial information for Cobol and Proclus.

Eames doesn’t believe that J-Day can be stopped – he is peculiar living proof that it _will_ happen, some time, some where – but he also believes that they, he and Arthur, can make it difficult. If they can push it back, just a year or a month or even a day, it will be worth it. He clings to this world, all its beauty and ugliness and naivety and joy, and he will defend it as long as he can.

~*~

When they get back topside, after they’ve separated and he’s met Eames back at the hotel, Arthur is furious to discover that, although Saito fell into Limbo, Cobb dragged him back out.

“I tried,” Eames says repeatedly. “I tried to talk him out of it, but there was no changing his mind.”

“I know,” Arthur growls, feeling almost guilty for lashing out at Eames. “I don’t blame you, I blame that fucking martyr Dominick Cobb. Jesus fucking Christ, it was a perfect opportunity, blow to shit by that asshole.”

Eames holds out a tumbler full of something, and Arthur throws it back without tasting it. “So _now_ are you done with him?”

The question is edgy, terse, but Arthur can’t bring himself to fault Eames for it. He knows how hard it’s been on Eames, keeping his distance, scrambling to find his way in this unfamiliar time, going against direct orders issued by a man to whom Eames has been devoted since he was just a kid. Arthur would rather not put too fine a point on who that man actually was. Is. Will be.

“Yes,” he says harshly. “I’m done with him.”

~*~

They stay in dreamshare; now that Arthur doesn’t have the excuse of babying Cobb, they only work together. They’re both wealthy men, and they only take jobs which have some chance of affecting Judgment Day.

After Eames confesses that he knew Yusuf before, Arthur refuses to hire him again, although he knows that Eames keeps in contact. Eames doesn’t want to use Ariadne, saying she’s too young for him to be around, and Arthur almost understands what that means, but sometimes, she’s the only one up to the challenge.

Bit by bit, they chip away at the corporations that are making headway in artificial intelligence. They knock the legs out from under any number of tech companies, expose scandals of CEOs, make anonymous reports to activist groups who are loudly against advances in robotics, bribe politicians and career soldiers to speak out against certain military programs. They can’t stop it, but they can create obstacles.

Eames forces Arthur to take vacations, something he’s never done before. He can rarely keep Arthur from working, but he does his best to keep him from working every minute. 

“We can only change the date,” he says, only because Arthur already knows this. “You need to make time to enjoy this world while you can. One day you’ll be glad you did.”

They still run into machines; they still have to flee cities and villages leaving a path of destruction strewn in their wake. After one particularly bad encounter, Arthur breaks off all contact with Ariadne, leaves enough money to pay for medical bills and the extensive rehabilitation she'll need. He slips a note into her hand while she sleeps, telling her not to look for them, and she doesn’t. 

They still have to go to ground and create new identities to throw law enforcement and machines alike off their trail, but that’s just the life.

Somehow, Arthur finds it easier than he ever has. Eames is protective, but he’s nowhere near as overwhelming as Arthur’s mother was. He trusts Arthur to be able to run to the market without fretting about how long he’s been gone; he knows Arthur sometimes needs time to be alone. He _believes_ in Arthur, body and soul, though he has no reservations about voicing any disagreement he might have. 

And although Arthur knows that Eames would do whatever he says without hesitation, he doesn’t use that against him. He can’t, not without good reason. Not if he’s one day going to lead hundreds of people who are willing to die for him. 

Arthur never felt that his mother had faith in him, for all her fierce insistence that she did. To her, he was always her little boy, someone to be protected, someone who couldn’t be allowed to take care of himself, because he was too important. From time he was small, she trained him to be a leader, a fighter, she never let up – but she never wanted to _let_ him lead. 

Eames treats Arthur like a soldier. He has faith, a staunch, bone-deep faith that sometimes scares the shit out of Arthur. 

Eames just believes, and Arthur does his best to not to disappoint him.

~*~

Eames’ Judgment Day is May 19, 2017, 9.42 p.m., GMT.

On May 12th, Eames says, “Let’s get a boat. Let’s take to the water and sail til the day is past or the whole thing goes up in flames.”

Arthur wants to argue, but Eames has been on edge for weeks. He’s been not sleeping more than usual, waking from nightmares in a cold sweat, hardly eating. And at any rate, there’s not much they can do in a week. 

So Arthur agrees. They rent a cruising yacht that can be handled by two, over-stock it, and set sail from Perth. Arthur thinks maybe they should have taken a larger boat, one with a crew, to save a few more souls if the end comes, but neither he nor Eames could put up a front for strangers.

They lay out in the sun, they drink, they spend hours making frantic, sweaty, languid, careful, desperate love, and they go for hours without talking. They pretend to have lost track of the date, but of course Arthur has worked out the time for their zone. Of course they can’t forget.

~*~

It’s still dark when Eames goes up on deck; he can’t sleep, not even when Arthur had done his dead-level best to wear him to exhaustion. He wraps himself in a blanket and sprawls in a deckchair, staring out into the darkness. He doesn’t know what to do; it’s not as if he can prepare himself for what may be about to happen.

He doesn’t know how long he’s been out there when Arthur appears. He stands next to Eames, and Eames reaches out to take his hand. “Sit with me, John.” He almost never uses that name, rarely uses it on purpose. 

Arthur glances down at him, banked fire in his eyes, and gives a soft smile that makes Eames’ heart clench. “That chair won’t hold us both.”

Eames promptly rises, wraps his arms around Arthur’s waist, and uses his greater weight to drag Arthur down to the deck. Arthur squawks in surprise, arms flailing, but starts laughing once they’ve hit the boards. “Unfair advantage,” he mock-frowns, and Eames has to kiss him; deep, hard, like it’s the last time or the first time, and Arthur melts into him.

Arthur sits between Eames’ legs, leaning against the solidity of Eames’ chest. Eames drapes the blanket around both of them, draws Arthur as close as he can. Arthur intertwines their fingers, and they sit, wordless, waiting for the sunrise.


End file.
